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Comment by kefka | Hacker News Reader

Unfortunately, this is how capitalism works. Currently the world wage median is $9733 (http://www.gallup.com/poll/166211/worldwide-median-household...)

If you make more than that, you're being squeezed down to it. Below that wage, machines don't make sense, yet. And with the squeeze happening with all of the 'sharing' economy, your wages will go even lower.

In effect, capitalism has failed us, as a country and as a world. Do I know the answer? Nope. Some will say communism, socialism, anarchism, or some -ism. But something will need to be set up differently. Lest we will see the US come out as a 3rd world country. And I'm not entirely sure it's not a good way there.

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You've just treated the entire world economy as if every individual is fungible, all tasks are identical, and transaction costs are completely negligible.

The only thing that's failed here is your perspective. The world is a very complex place and the last thing it needs more of are people pondering half-thought "solutions" to problems they haven't given an iota of thought to.

Youre right. The world economy is a humongous place. However, what happens when there is 10% unemployment? What about 20 percent unemployment? Or what happens when the screws capitalism are turned and you see 90 percent unemployment? That is is the intended result of capitalism, is it not? To me that was a fail system. And communism and socialism have both proven to be failures.

now, what do we do about this? Honestly, I have no clue.

Employment is a fairly broad solution. More fundamentally, if you don't give people something to do (i.e. purpose) they will probably just riot and start a revolution of some sort.

Where is the market for a driverless taxi if nobody can afford to catch one?

If you're an optimist, there will always be meaningful work to be done (for some kind of credit), supported by a government that knows to placate a society, they need to feel useful.

A pessimist on the other hand might subscribe to the cyclical nature of the rise and fall of civilisations. They catalyst this time being technological development moving faster than our ability to mentally and socially digest it.

We have only got about a billions years left. Let's make them count.

This guy proposes a thing. His background is Marxist, so, usual grain of salt going along with that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guSdjsctrUQ

For those without the time (or grit) for Richard D. Wolff the idea is to replace the top-down autocratic organization of the corporate structure with a bottom-up democratic one of worker self-directed cooperatives. The idea being that risk and liability are spread across a large base of people - not unlike insurance. At the same time it fails to concentrate wealth in a few 'top dogs' and decisions made democratically are less likely to screw over workers 'for the good of stakeholders'. Wolff hopes that, as the decision makers of such a body are likely to live in the area their business affects, decisions made are less likely to pollute or otherwise externalize costs to the local area. For instances where individual decision making must be had (due to expertise or importance of swiftness) or where management of workers is needed - he refers to the successes of the Mondragon Corporation (where they, as laborers, hire and fire the managers that manage themselves based on how good they are).

Thanks. I was pressed for time when I made the comment and it's been a few months since I listened to the talk, so I didn't trust my ability to put together an accurate summary in the time I had available.

Yup, below $9733 USD per year is poverty in Mexico.

More than 50% of mexicans live with less than that.

That's why USA is so atractive to millions of inmigrants.

$4/day in Mexico vs $8/hr in the USA?!

It's a no-brainer.

I happen to hate capitalism, but we need to pick the right target. Uber is crony corporatism and technical totalitarianism, quite unlike the imaginary concepts of theoretical capitalism.

How is Uber crony capitalism? Uber is capitalism working exactly as designed, workers are disposable and profit seeking is unregulated. The taxi services are closer to crony capitalism.

> How is Uber crony capitalism?

Because that is the phrase for extra bad capitalism, right? The regulatory capture of the rent seeking income inequality causing corporatism, occupy HN!

I'm seeing a lot of posts lately that remind me of Randian villains. Two dimensional characters who are uniformly ugly and buffoonish - so that the reader instantly knows the bad guys.

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